France's new Minister of Culture vows to support a strong copyright regime

By Emmanuel Legrand

France's new Minister of Culture Roselyne Bachelot intends to put "culture at the heart of the reconstruction plan for our country, laminated by an economic, health, social and moral crisis of a magnitude which is still difficult to qualify the contours." Bachelot made the comments on the day she took over from outgoing Minister of Culture Franck Riester, who has been appointed to the position of Minister of for Foreign Trade and Attractiveness in the government formed by new Prime Minister Jean Castex.

Roselyne Bachelot and Franck Riester
(Photo: Ministère de la Culture)

  In the two years he was in the role, Riester was a driving force during the adoption of the European Copyright Directive. He also helped create the National Music Center to support the music sector and has presented before Parliament an ambitious media bill.

  Bachelot also said that her ambition is to continue to build a strong framework for "the preservation of copyright and intellectual property." But for her, the "absolute urgency" at the start of this summer "will be to help restore and restart cultural sites, festivals, theaters, museums, cinemas, historic monuments. It’s almost a matter of life and death for so many people, direct jobs and peripheral jobs."

Regain artistic vitality

  Labelling herself he Minister of Artists and the Minister of the Territories, Bachelot said one of her priorities would be to hold what she called the Estates General of festivals "so that next season will regain its artistic vitality, its role in democratisation and economic irrigation."

  Opera-lover Bachelot, 73, was unexpectedly named at this crucial position in the cabinet reshuffle. She held previous ministerial jobs in conservative government and has become in the past years a popular host of radio and TV shows. Many in the industry believe that she will have the political clout to get things done and obtain the budgets to support a sector that has been seriously impacted by the Covid-19 crisis.

  Collecting society ADAMI, which represents artists, welcomed the arrival of Bachelot at the Ministry of Culture, which inherits "a prominent personality to lead major cultural projects while Emmanuel Macron recently made culture one of its four priority projects." For ADAMI, Bachelot's experience "will be particularly valuable when the entire sector, and in particular the artists, has been seriously affected by the health crisis." ADAMI is asking Bachelot to take a stand on the issue of the online remuneration of artists, which is inscribed in the Copyright Directive.

Urgency to adopt EU's Copyright Directive

  Record labels' body SNEP said Bachelot has "all the qualities to defend the artists and companies that invest in the creation and production of music in our country." SNEP said one of the priorities should be the quick transposition of the European Copyright Directive, which is currently debated by Parliament. "Recorded music producers have confidence in the new minister’s determination to take into account the urgency of adopting this text, which alone will allow the necessary rebalancing of the relationship between rights holders and video sharing platforms," said SNEP.

  Society SACD, which represents drama authors, is expecting from Bachelot "a massive, dynamic and innovative recovery plan."

> The amendments allowing French Government to transpose the Copyright, Cab-Sat and SMA Directives have been adopted by the Parliament. Amendment 23 states that the Government is “empowered to complete the transposition of Directive 2019/790 from April 17 2019 on copyright and related rights in the digital single market." Article 15 (neighbouring rights for news publishers) of the Copyright Directive had already been transposed into law on July 24, 2019.

The amendment fixes a six month deadline for the adoption of ordinances transposing Articles 17 to 23 of the Copyright Directive, and a 12 month deadline for the others provisions of the directive. Concerning the “cable-satellite” directive, the ordinances must be issued within 12 months of the promulgation of the law.